This is one of a number of paintings on an exhibition I was lucky to see in June 2007 in the Rezan Has Museum, part of the Kadir Has University complex. This is situated in a former Tekel factory on the Bosporus. I loved its architecture and I for one will regularly check if there are new exhibitions.

Man reading a Koran by Osman Hamdi Bey (1842-1910). I have known the painter for years mainly from a reproduction in the Archaelogical Museum, of what is probably his most well known work, The tortoise trainer (that I have also seen now, in the Pera Museum). The artist was a very important man: he founded the Archaeological Museum as well as the Istanbul Academy of Fine Arts.